


Long Time, No See

by SidheRa



Category: Avengers (Comics), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: 69 (Sex Position), Barebacking, Developing Relationship, Drunk Sex, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Feelings, Fingerfucking, Floor Sex, Getting Back Together, Hand Jobs, Kitchen Sex, Oral Sex, PWP, Party, Public Display of Affection, Public Sex, Woman on Top
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-19
Updated: 2013-01-20
Packaged: 2017-11-26 00:40:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/644655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SidheRa/pseuds/SidheRa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Natasha and Clint have been avoiding the obvious for years. All of that changes when Tony Stark throws a party.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A 616 fic set in the same timeline (and as a pseudo-prequel to) one of my other stories, Saturday Mornings in Bed-Stuy. You needn’t have read that one or the comics, however, to read this (PWP, what?). 
> 
> Thanks, as ever, to the Hive Mind for betaing, hand holding, and not laughing at my whining. Special thanks to eiluned for the title. <3!!

She was only there because they'd gotten drunk.

 

They wouldn't have been stupid enough to hang out together otherwise, not alone. They avoided spending too much time together in the years since they'd broken it off (if one could even call it that), not because they didn't want to be around each other, but because there had always been enough sexual tension between the two of them to smother an ox, and they'd been careful not to tempt fate.

 

And then Tony Stark threw the party to end all parties.

 

She'd ended up drinking half a bottle of exorbitantly expensive scotch, which had been followed in short order by ignoring her better judgment and going home with Clint.

 

She turned her head to look at the man in question, still fast asleep beside her. He was snoring lightly, there was a bit of drool running out of the corner of his mouth, and his hair was in complete disarray. He shifted in his sleep as she watched him, rolling onto his side. His snoring deepened with the change in his position, and she briefly debated putting a pillow over his head to drown out the noise. Somehow, he managed to be an annoying ass even when he was asleep.

 

Oh, and she was pretty sure she was still in love with him.

 

Fuck.

 

<><><><><>

 

_5 Hours Earlier_

 

She wasn't sure why she bothered to come to these things, except that maybe sometimes she got lonely spending the holidays on her own. It didn't make sense, but then, not many things in her life did. But, she supposed, when your job necessitated that you work with superhumans, gods, and mutants, well, maybe sense took a leave of absence.

 

Still, it was stupid of her to come to the party. She didn't know the people here, not really, not the ones who weren't already three sheets to the wind. She knew Stark, of course, and Cap and Matt and most of the handful of Xavier's mutants that had shown up. They, however, were the sort of people that drank too much too quickly – the sort who proceeded to get too drunk for her tastes. She wasn't a gregarious drunk, never had been, which meant that even though she'd rapidly caught up to the rest in terms of intoxication, she couldn't bring herself to talk to any of them. Besides, what would she even say? Hey, Anna, how's the pariah life treating you? Oh, good to see you Logan! Fight any interesting alien samurai lately?

 

Please.

 

She'd been here less than an hour, and already she'd segregated herself out on the balcony, her interlude punctuated only by the random smoker and a couple stumbling outside to steal a moment, only to be sent on their way by her glare.

 

She took another deep drink from her glass, enjoying the burn of the alcohol as it slid down her throat. She didn't drink often, but when she did, she made sure it was worth it. She could always trust Tony to spring for the good stuff.

 

_Even if he didn't realize he'd sprung for it_ , she thought with a smirk.

 

She looked up at the stars, leaning her chin heavily on the back of her palm, wondering just how the fuck she'd ended up here.

 

“Oh, hey, sorry. I didn't realize anyone was out here.”

 

She'd already turned around by the time he'd started talking, recognized his gait from the sound of his footsteps as he approached the door. She was inebriated enough, though, that the sight of him out here in what was ostensibly her space hit her like a punch to the gut.

 

She hadn't forgotten her attraction to Clint Barton, that much was clear. She could feel the liquid heat of attraction pull in the pit of her stomach as he stepped closer despite his words. Even all those years ago, back when he was young and stupid and willing to do just about anything for a mysterious redhead with an accent, she'd enjoyed the hell out of being with him. He'd been an attentive, if inexperienced lover, but everything he'd lacked in technique he'd more than made up for in enthusiasm.

 

She ran her eyes up and down his body quickly, only halfheartedly trying to escape notice. She'd caught him looking often enough, and besides, Clint had only improved with age, his former lankiness transformed into lithe strength. She'd spent many a night alone with thoughts of that body to keep her company.

 

“You mind if I . . .?” he asked, gesturing toward the railing where she'd been leaning.

 

She shook her head. “By all means,” she invited, resting her elbows on the cold metal. He took up a place next to her.

 

“So what's a girl like you doing in a place like this?” he asked, mirth glinting in his voice.

 

She chuckled under her breath. “Same as you, I suppose. Bored. Nowhere else to be.”

 

He leaned into her, jostled her with the press of his shoulder. “How've you been, Nat?”

 

She wasn't sure what she was supposed to say to that. There wasn't much she could say about her life, except that it somehow kept moving forward, even after all that shit with Thanos.

 

She shrugged.

 

“Yeah, me too,” he said, taking a drink from his own glass. She could see him peering over his shoulder in the periphery of her vision. “When did I start feeling so old?”

 

She couldn't help the spurt of laughter that bubbled up out of her at that, a choked, chortling noise that lilted off into the night. “Probably sometime after you came back from the dead. Usually does it for me.”

 

He let out a low laugh and brought his glass over toward her. “I'll drink to that.”

 

She touched the rim of her cup to his and drank, finishing off her scotch in one swallow.

 

He was still leaning against her, still pressing hot against her side, and dammit, he was distracting her. She'd wanted to be alone out here, had wanted to sulk with only the stars and a bottle for company. Why the hell did Clint think he could come out here and cheer her up with his stupid, sexy smile?

 

“Great party,” she said non-noncommittally, trying not to think about the lean muscle mass pressed into her shoulder.

 

“Better scotch,” he said, swirling the last of his liquor in the bottom of the glass.

 

“What'd you get?” she asked, thankful for the safe topic.

 

“A Lagavulin 21,” he replied, tipping back the rest of his drink.

 

She smirked and ducked to grab the bottle she'd stashed in a corner earlier. Holding it aloft in front of Clint, she waited for his reaction. She wasn't disappointed.

 

He whistled long and low in appreciation. “Jesus, Nat, where the hell did you get a Bowman 40?”

 

“Stark puts out that cheap ass Lagavulin shit to throw you lot off the scent. Found this stashed in his wall safe.”

 

He tossed her a lopsided grin and held out his now empty glass. “Well, I'd hate to let your efforts go to waste . . .”

 

She poured him a finger, then another for herself. Secreting the bottle below a side table, she held her glass out. “To Tony Stark and $10,000 bottles of scotch!”

 

“To Stark,” he said, clinking his glass against hers and adding, “And to old friends.”

 

He said the last with a strange smile, one that she couldn't quite parse. She drank, debating her next statement. It was either the scotch or the company or the slight chill in the air, but something made her decide to go with the foremost thing on her mind when she probably should have steered toward safer topics, ones that didn't directly involve her feelings where Barton was concerned.

 

“I've been thinking about . . . old friends lately,” she said. “Us, I mean.”

 

“Us?” he asked, carefully.

 

She crossed her arms, leaning her forehead against the cool glass. “That whole, um, kissing . . . thing,” she managed, then sipped to cover her discomfort and hopefully give herself some liquid courage.

 

He sighed. “I'm sorry about that, Nat. I shouldn't have . . .”

 

“No,” she said sharply, cutting him off. “No, _we_ shouldn't have,” she said. “But we did, and . . .”

 

It was Clint's turn to cut her off. “I broke it off with Jess.”

 

She didn't know what to say to that, but then Clint took her glass and placed both cups on the table next to them.

 

“Hey!” she protested weakly, but she didn't stop him, didn't move to take back her glass. “I was drinking that!”

 

“Yeah, but you've got something on your . . .” he said, reaching out to brush something off her forehead with his forefinger. It was a clumsy tack for him to take, but she would hardly complain. She felt the contact ripple through her body, felt it snake its way down her body and settle in the pit of her stomach. It threatened to overtake her, to muddle her senses and make her forget that this was _Clint_ , her best friend, not some random guy she'd just happened to bump into at a party.

 

So she panicked a little.

 

She tried to step back, to step away from him, but she ran into a chair, trapped.

 

He didn't relent, though, and then he was cupping her cheek, staring into her eyes, and she should try harder to get away, she really should, but he was leaning in, closer, and she just didn't fucking want to be anywhere else.

 

He bent down and pressed his lips to hers.

 

He tasted everything and nothing like she remembered. He was still Clint, and this was still the same mouth she'd spent so much time with all those years ago. He was still the same person that she'd conned into helping her, the same young idiot she'd tried to write off when he switched sides. He was still the same Clint that helped her decide to leave her former life behind, the one who'd convinced her that he'd forgiven her for seducing him, the one that had decided he liked her better as a friend.

 

She'd be more inclined to believe the last if it weren't for the firm press of his arousal against her belly.

 

“Shit,” she said, pulling back to breathe. “I was afraid of that.”

 

He nipped at her lip. “Afraid of what?”

 

She bit back a groan, leaning her forehead against his while she tried to catch her breath. “Afraid that it would feel like this.”

 

He pulled her in for another slow kiss, sliding his tongue against hers.

 

“It does, doesn't it,” he agreed lowly, the gravel in his voice twisting up her insides.

 

She decided not to fight it, not when they were both single and pleasantly drunk on expensive spirits, not when they were both still so clearly attracted to each other. There was nothing holding them back, nothing except the fear that this would mess up their friendship, and that fear wasn't great enough to overpower the exhilaration she felt at tangling herself up in Clint again, not here, not now, not tonight.

 

She wrapped her arms around his neck and twined her fingers through the short tufts of his hair, holding him as closely as she dared. He burned her, scorched her, ate up all of her oxygen and good sense in one shot, and fuck, she'd missed being with him like this.

 

His tongue darted out, running along the length of her bottom lip, and she fought the urge to groan, forced herself not to wrap herself around him and beg him to fuck her. She could feel herself grow wetter by the moment, could feel him grow harder against her, and she knew he wanted her just as badly as she him. It was a heady, confusing feeling, and was shocked at how quickly he'd reduced her to this, how quickly she lost her cool.

 

His hands dropped lower on her back, rested on the curve of her ass, and she arched against him in response, pressing her belly flat against his. She sucked on his lip, bit down lightly as he pulled back, and she let out a hiss of frustration only to have him press his mouth back against her.

 

He sucked a trail down her neck, licked the hollow of her throat, and when he put his hand on her hip, she didn't hesitate to draw her leg up to his waist. He grabbed her firmly, held her against him and thrust against her core, and when she bucked against him, she hummed her pleasure at the friction.

 

“Yes,” she hissed when he palmed her breast, plucking at her nipple through the thin fabric of her dress. He turned them suddenly, pushed her back against the railing. She could see over his shoulder into the party, could see the people milling about inside of Stark's apartment, oblivious to the action taking place outside. Those people wouldn't remain oblivious, though, not for long, not with the two of them acting the way they were, out in the open for the whole world to see.

 

“Clint,” she murmured, tapping the back of his head. “Clint, we've gotta . . .”

 

He looked up from her cleavage, bleary eyed and blinking. “What?”

 

She took a breath. “We should move,” she said, indicating the glass door at the other end of the balcony.

 

He glanced over his shoulder, then turned back to her. “You sure you just aren't trying to let me down easy?”

 

She snorted, then dragged him off to the side of the deck, out of sight of the party goers. Without preamble, she pushed him back against the wall then held her body against his. Leaning in close enough that they were sharing the same air, she whispered, “I have no intention of letting you down.”

 

She slanted her mouth over his, grabbing the collar of his shirt and holding him fast. She felt decidedly strange at the moment, wild and uncontrolled, but somehow safe and normal, and for once, the dichotomy didn't bother her. She just held on to Clint's tighter and ground her ass against his hand when he gripped her.

 

His hand slipped up under the hem of her dress, and she could feel his fingers toying with the edge of her panties, could feel his hands hot on the top of her upper thighs. She pulled back from him, keenly watching his face as he explored higher, ran his finger underneath the elastic and drew closer to her center.

 

“God, you're beautiful,” he said, panting as he squeezed her ass. “I can't believe this is happening.”

 

She didn't have anything to say to that, didn't know how to explain that she thought the same thing, so she just kissed him again, breathed him in and tasted him, reminded herself of all the reasons that she had such a hard time breaking his heart in the first place.

 

He turned her around in his arms suddenly, and took his hands in hers. Putting them up on the wall in front of them he said, “Stay still, baby.”

 

No one called her that. No one got away with saying those things to her, and if you'd asked her yesterday, she would have told you that she would bristle at such a nickname. She would have said that she would have the balls of the person who dared to call her such a thing.

 

Yesterday, however, she didn't have Clint Barton sucking on her neck and fingering through her panties while Tony Stark threw a party on the other side of the wall. Yesterday, she couldn't have anticipated how wet it made her to hear the word roll off his tongue. She wanted to be annoyed. She wanted to be upset.

 

And then he nibbled on her earlobe, pulled the skirt of her dress up around her waist, and called her that again, and _fuck_ she was going to come quickly if he kept up those motions with his hand.

 

He ran his fingers across her mound, teasing her until she was whimpering, and then, without any warning, he slid a single finger along the length of her slit and dipped inside of her.

 

“You're so fucking wet, Nat,” he said, and she'd make fun of him for stating the obvious except that it just made her want him more. She could feel his erection clearly where it was pressing into her thigh, and he was rubbing against her in time with the motions of his fingers.

 

She was panting now, rolling her hips as he swirled around her clit, driving her further and further toward the edge madness. Just when she thought she couldn't take it anymore, just when she thought she was going to turn around and tear his pants down, just when she was going to climb him and impale herself on his cock, Tony Stark and his party guests be damned, that was the moment that he shoved three fingers up inside of her, stretched her open and fucked her with his hand.

 

She let out a strangled sound, cursing him in every language she could still grasp, and she sagged backward, her head lolling onto his shoulder as he moved. The heel of his hand rubbed maddeningly against her clit, and she wiggled her hips to increase the stimulation.

 

“Wanna feel you come, baby,” he whispered into her ear, and there it was again, that _name_ , and she thought she might fall apart just from that alone. He increased his pace, and his free hand moved up her torso, up to her breasts. He palmed her through the fabric, rolling her nipples, and the combination of the stimulation of his fingers and the lace of her bra sent her into a boneless tumble. Without any more warning than a sudden tightening in her stomach and a rush of warmth, she was coming, grasping his fingers where he was clutching at her tits, bearing down on them in her efforts not to shout her release and arouse the attentions of the people inside.

 

She turned her face into his neck as she shuddered, breathing in his scent as her heart rate returned to normal. She shifted in his arms, drew him down for a kiss, and she was just drunk enough on whisky and Clint that she didn't mind how good it felt to be held by him, how natural it felt, how much it felt like coming home.

 

They swayed like that for a long moment, clinging to each other in the dark, listening to the music throb through the wall, and it didn't feel anything like it used to, nothing at all.

 

It was better.

 

He was still hard against her, still pressing insistently into her, and she couldn't think of anything she would rather do than get him somewhere truly private, to take him home, strip all his clothes off and wedge his thick cock inside of her.

 

She opened her mouth to speak, to ask him if he wanted to do just that, but he beat her to the punch.

 

“You want to get out of here?”

 

“Thought you'd never ask.”

 

<><><><><>

 

The trip downstairs to the cab Clint called was interesting, not least of all because she felt high, pleasantly buzzed from the alcohol and her orgasm. They'd agreed to slip out one at a time, with Natasha following ten minutes after him to avoid any suspicious gazes. It wouldn't do to have any of their teammates knowing about this, whatever _this_ was, especially when they weren't sure themselves.

 

Not that they really had to worry. Stark really got the party moving sometime around the time Clint had stumbled onto the balcony, and she'd be shocked if even one person had noticed her walk through the room, much less leave it.

 

Still.

 

She met him downstairs, found him waiting for her in the back of the cab.

 

“Hi,” she said, pretending that this wasn't the most awkward situation she'd been in recently.

 

“Hey,” he replied, and then gave a few quick directions to the cabbie. He turned to her when he was finished. “I thought we'd go back to mine,” he said, stammering, “Unless you just wanted to share the cab. Because that would be fine, you know you don't have to . . .”

 

She smiled, picking up on his own nervousness, feeling herself relax a little now that she knew he was in precisely the same boat that she was in. She touched a finger to his lips, shutting him up.

 

“No, yours is fine,” she said. “It's closer, isn't it?”

 

He swallowed hard and shifted closer to her at that, and some of the nervous tension between them resolved itself, dissipated into the air. He leaned into her, hooked a thumb under her chin and brought her mouth to his. Heedless of the man driving the car, she kissed him back for all she was worth. She wanted to taste more of him, wanted to press her lips against the rest of him, and she began to work her way down. Nipping lightly at his lips, she moved along his jaw, then down to the soft flesh of his neck, sucking on his skin, leaving a mark. She skimmed her hand down his chest then, over his stomach, down into his lap where she was greeted with his rising interest.

 

She grinned against his neck. Licking along the rim of his ear, she whispered, “You wanna know what I'm thinking about doing with this?”

 

He squirmed underneath her, tried to angle his hips away, tried holding on to her wrist to halt her motions, but she didn't let him stop her, didn't let him off the hook. She bit down on the fleshy part of his earlobe and said, “First I'm going to take off your clothes, piece by piece, until I get to see you naked.”

 

She grabbed his cock tighter, rubbed him up and down through his jeans as she continued to lay out her plans. “Then I'm going to lick every inch of your body, starting with those tight fucking abs of yours . . .”

 

He moaned under his breath as she continued, as she told him about all the ways she'd imagined having him. She started to grow wet again, squirming in her seat and crossing her legs as she narrated, getting so very turned on by the way Clint was losing control next to her, by the way he barely could restrain himself from leaping on top of her.

 

He was bucking against her hand by the time she started describing what she was going to do to his cock, and he let out a breathy moan that drew the attention of the cabbie. The man didn't say anything though, just glanced backward and kept driving, so Natasha took that as tacit permission to keep up her ministrations.

 

Two blocks away from his apartment, she felt Clint blow his load in his jeans, felt the crush of his fingers around her wrist, holding her hand in place even as he came in hot spurts against her palm, soaking the placket of his pants. She smiled wickedly at the cab driver's mild expression in the rear view mirror. She doubted this would be the oddest thing the guy had seen happen in the backseat of his cab. Hell, she figured this wouldn't be the oddest thing he saw _tonight_.

 

Clint rested his head on her shoulder then, and they rode the last two blocks in silence.

 

She'd let him get his rest where he could. He'd need it.  


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to eiluned for listening to me babble about this part pretty much all day. <3 x 1000000000!

His head was still swimming when they got to his building, though whether it was more from the alcohol or Natasha, he didn't know. She'd always been something of a hellcat in bed, and it seemed like time hadn't lessened her ability to knock him for a loop.

 

Jesus Christ, he couldn't believe she'd made him come in his pants like that, especially not here, in the backseat of a fucking cab. How old was he again? Hadn't he saved the world a couple of times? Wasn't he supposed to have better control over himself than that?

 

Looking at Natasha next to him, delightfully rumpled and smiling coquettishly at him, he rather got the feeling that she could provoke such a reaction in anyone. He decided he should just feel damn lucky that she'd wanted to do it to him.

 

The cab came to a slow halt, and Clint started to feel nervous again, like he had back on the balcony when she'd kissed him, when she'd admitted that maybe there was still something there between them, when she'd hinted that maybe it had never gone away.

 

He watched her slip out of the cab, wondering if they were making a mistake, if they were headed down a path that would ruin the friendship they'd worked so hard to keep. Maybe they were just drunk, maybe they should stop this before it really got started, like she had back before the thing with Thanos, when she'd been hurt and he'd patched her up; when they'd kissed and she'd reminded him that he'd had a girlfriend. Then again, both Thanos and said girlfriend were history, and Natasha had been very willing to let him finger her on Stark's balcony. Not to mention that she'd returned the favor just now. If it was a mistake, they were both making it, both diving into this headlong.

 

Clint paid the cabbie and followed her out into the night.

 

“Nice building,” she said, but he couldn't tell if she was serious.

 

“You like it? It's mine,” he said, and he was impressed with how calm he sounded.

 

She snorted like she didn't believe him, side-eyed him. “Oh,” she exclaimed, obviously having realized he was serious. “Wow. You've come up in the world, Barton.”

 

He shrugged. It wasn't much, but it was home.

 

She moved closer and smiled, leaning into him when he slung his arm around her back, and she let him lead her into the building without further comment. They took the stairs (damned elevator was still out), but she took that in stride, slipping off her heels and taking the stairs barefoot.

 

They made it to his apartment without running into any of his neighbors (he still hesitated over the word “tenants”, wasn't really sure where building owner fit into his list of job descriptions), and he only fumbled his keys a little when he unlocked the door.

 

Natasha gave him one of her more mysterious smiles when she preceded him inside.

 

“What?” he asked, doing a quick scan of the room. It wasn't really that messy, even if there were random dishes left out and some clothes here and there.

 

She shook her head, still smiling. “No, it's nothing,” she said. “It's just . . . this place is you.” She said the last bit meeting his eyes, and he fought the blush that started to rise.

 

He scratched the back of his neck nervously and toed off his shoes. What was he supposed to say to that, exactly? It was strange, bringing Natasha back here for the first time, not least of all because she knew him well enough to make that statement. It might not have been that long since he'd taken someone back to his place with such intent behind it, but it definitely had been one hell of a long time since he'd wanted to sleep with someone who knew the first damn thing about him.

 

And Natasha? Well, Natasha knew _everything_ about him. She was the person he knew the best in the world, and in return, the person who knew him better than anyone else, ex-wife included. Natasha had been there back at the beginning, back when he was an naive carny with delusions of grandeur, back when he thought he was going to be the next Iron Man. She knew him before he started hanging out with superheroes, knew what drove him to crime, knew what existed inside of him that took him away from that life and turned him into something that maybe wasn't entirely good, but was certainly better.

 

She'd been there through the whole mess with Bobbi, had fought beside him when he was married without batting an eye, had saved his life more times than he could count. She'd been there through his string of girlfriends, had watched from a distance when each relationship imploded on itself, and she'd offered him a stiff drink and a shoulder. They'd been friends over the years, real ones, the kind that maybe couldn't forget that they once spent a week after a score locked up together in a hotel room in Vegas, but certainly could put it aside for the sake of something concrete and grounding.

 

She knew about all of his successes, all of his mistakes. Hell, she even knew his shoe size. And yet she was still here, still had come back with him to this apartment, still wanted to sleep with him, even knowing all the ways in which he was likely to fuck everything up.

 

Christ, he wasn't sure he could live with himself if he fucked this up.

 

Clearing his throat, he said, “You want a drink?” His voice sounded more certain than he felt, and he congratulated himself on keeping steady as he walked into the kitchen.

 

Natasha followed him. “What have you got?” He knew he was pretty far gone when even the sound of her voice asking that simple question was enough to make his stomach lurch. He took a deep breath to calm his nerves.

 

He bent to look in his fridge. “There's a couple of beers in here,” he said, then pulled open his freezer, wondering if he still had that Polish vodka Kate had brought over last weekend. Successful, he pulled the bottle out from between the frozen dinners and showed it to Natasha with a grin.

 

“Vodka?” he asked.

 

She rolled her eyes theatrically. “ _Da, tovarich_ ,” she said, playing up her accent and sounding like the woman he'd met years ago.

 

When he couldn't take the heat of her eyes any longer, he turned to look for glasses, but Natasha snatched the bottle out of his hand, screwing off the cap and bringing the container straight to her lips. She drank like she always had, without reservation, and she grimaced after she swallowed.

 

“Damn, Barton, still drinking the cheap shit?”

 

He took the bottle from her, covering for his inexplicable reaction at the sight of her lipstick clinging to the rim by taking his own swallow of the liquid.

 

“Have some faith in me. Kate brought it over,” he said, handing the bottle back to her.

 

Natasha raised her eyebrow, pausing with the bottle midway to her mouth. “And how is your little protegee these days?”

 

He shrugged, started to answer, but then Natasha's tongue darted out to grab a droplet of vodka that was running down the bottleneck, and for the life of him, he couldn't remember what she'd asked.

 

She placed the bottle on the counter rather than handing it to him, which was probably for the best. Liquid courage only worked up to a certain dosage, and he wasn't sure he could handle much more and still be any good for her.

 

She touched a hand to her hair. “Do you have a bathroom in this place?”

 

He blinked at her. “What?”

 

She repeated her question, then added, “I need to take my hair down.”

 

He showed her down the hall and to the left, and even though he thought that maybe he wasn't supposed to do it, he hovered in the doorway anyway, watching her take the pins out of her hair. He smiled to himself when he saw her pull a long, thin stick out of her hair, knowing full well that it was a hidden blade - only Natasha would wear a knife to a Stark party.

 

She shook her hair at long last, ran her fingers through the curls, and she sighed in relief. He could barely breathe at the sight of her there, relaxing, dropping her guard. She looked happier, somehow, younger, maybe, with her hair hanging around her shoulders, and he had the urge to run his fingers through it himself, to touch it and find out if it was as soft as it looked.

 

She must have felt his gaze on her because she looked at him in the mirror, and he was lost. He stopped fighting the pull, let himself move on instinct, and he stepped in close to her, invading her space and touching her shoulders delicately, teasingly. She shivered at the light contact, breathed out heavily, and he took that as permission to pull her back against him.

 

He drew his hands slowly up her arms, watching her watch him in the reflection of the mirror, and when he started to grow hard again, when he felt the flush of heat in the pit of his stomach, he was gratified to see the attendant flush of arousal deepen on her cheeks. His eyes tracked the rosy hue as it spread down her neck to her chest, and he suddenly needed to touch her there, needed to feel her scarlet skin underneath his palms.

 

He brought his hands up to her shoulders, then across her upper chest, and he let them continue on their path downward, his motions recalling his earlier ones on the balcony, but it was better this time, somehow more real under the heat of the light and his watchful gaze. She arched against his hands when he caressed her breasts through the thin fabric of her dress, and he heard her gasp, the sound loud in the silent apartment. Still half-expecting her to push him away, to regain her senses and leave, he was shocked to feel how aroused she was from his nearness, from his touch.

 

He should stop, he knew he should, but his hands kept moving, and her skin was hot and pliant beneath his palms and he couldn't tear himself away. He grabbed the neck of her dress, slipping the material down, pulling it over the swell of her breasts, exposing her. He palmed her peaks softly, tweaked her nipples lightly, remembering just how much she'd appreciated that action in that long ago time when they were a unit rather than two separate entities. Turning her face into his neck, she sighed against him, groaned his name into the air, practically purring in his arms. He was surer in his movements this time, could rely on more recent memory to tell him what she liked, and this time he did not hesitate to hike her skirt up, did not hesitate to sweep his palm down until he was rubbing against her center, until he could feel her slick heat throbbing against the pads of his fingers. Her panties were soaked through, sopping, and fuck, he missed this, missed her.

 

“We should stop,” he said half-heartedly into her ear because she was his best friend and he should know better than to do this with her, but his hands were still moving, wandering all over her body, searching her folds, plucking at her nipples

 

“Probably should . . . Oh, _fuck!_ ” she cried, gasping for air and clutching his arm when he glanced across her clit. “Oh god, Clint, don't you fucking dare stop.”

 

If he had been painfully hard before, he was in agony now, and he thrust against her backside, reveling in the easy friction that she exacerbated with the rolling of her hips. His tongue darted out almost of its own volition, tracing the lines of her ear, and he grinned at the way she was losing her tightly wound control.

 

“This is such a bad idea,” she said, pressing her ass more firmly against him. Then she reached down, grabbed his cock through his jeans like before, and he almost lost it again, almost exploded like he had in the cab.

 

He spun her around in his arms, cutting her off before he did just that.

 

“A really fucking terrible idea,” he agreed, and then he crashed his mouth down over hers.

 

He could taste the traces of alcohol on her tongue, mixed thoroughly as it was with the flavor of her. Kissing her was a revelation, a homecoming, something he hadn't even realized how badly he'd missed until she was here in his arms, pressing her lips to his and slipping her tongue inside his mouth to war with his own.

 

Fuck, he'd missed her.

 

She twined her arms around his neck, clenched her fingers in his hair, just as eager for his touch as he was for hers. Her hands were everywhere at once, tugging, grabbing, holding, and she didn't stop, didn't let up, didn't relent, assaulting his senses from every angle.

 

He forced her backward a few steps in his desperation to get closer, and her “Oomph!” of surprise dragged him back to earth, pulled his head out of the stupor of alcohol and Natasha.

 

He broke off their kiss, panting. “Shit, we should . . .” he started, but he didn't have a clue how to end it. They should what, exactly? He could list a thousand things he'd like to do right now, but none of them were sensible, and it was hard to even entertain the thought of not touching her right now.

 

Natasha blinked at him owlishly, her hands resting on his forearms.

 

“It's awesome that you want to be all noble right now,” she said. “But if I didn't want this, I never would have come home with you in the first place.”

 

He took a step backward, forced himself to look in her eyes and not at the rest of her, disheveled and effectively topless as she leaned against his sink. “So,” he began slowly, drawing out the syllable. “You aren't going to regret this in the morning?”

 

She pushed off the sink and pulled her dress off over her head in one smooth motion.

 

“Oh, hell, no,” she said. “I've been waiting too long for this. You?” At his (embarrassingly frantic) shake of the head, she reached behind her back, unhooking her bra and dropping it to the ground.

 

“In that case,” she said, “You've got ten seconds to take that shirt off and get me into bed before I start to get pissed.”

 

He did it in seven.

 

<><><><><>

 

She was having a hard time wrapping her mind around the sequence of events that led up to her current position, sandwiched between Clint's abs and his mattress.

 

She remembered getting dressed for Tony's party, remembered . . . _borrowing_ Tony’s scotch, remembered Clint running into her. She remembered falling against him, coming apart in his arms. She even remembered making the decision to head back to his place - really, she remembered every bit of it (she wasn't _that_ drunk), it was just that she didn't understand what alignment of the stars had to led to her getting to reacquaint herself with those delightfully chiseled abs of his.

 

Say what you would about the dangers inherent to her job, but one of the perks was definitely getting to work with a bunch of men who could moonlight as models. And Clint, well, he had the added benefit of really knowing what to do with that body.

 

Case in point – he was currently lapping at her breasts, drawing one nipple at a time into his mouth, biting down just to the point of pain, sucking and swirling his tongue, blowing air over the hardened peaks as he switched sides. It was driving her mad, watching him, feeling him, wanting him, and her brain was rapidly shorting itself out, overloaded on sensation.

 

Christ, she didn't think that he'd been this attentive the last time they were together (could she really have forgotten something so intense?) Then again, that was years ago, and if her own fantasies were anything to go on, he'd had a lot of time to think about what he would do to her if he ever managed to get her naked again. For that matter, he hadn't even gotten her naked yet, and she was already most of the way to a screaming orgasm, if the tightening in her belly was anything to go on.

 

Every part of her body felt like it was on fire where he touched her, and she drew her legs around his hips to grind against him. She clawed at his shoulders, feeling herself grow hotter suddenly, unexpectedly as he worked her, and if she weren't so far out of her mind with lust, she might feel embarrassed about the throaty groan that came out of her just then. He cupped her breasts in his palms, giving them a light squeeze as he released her nipple with a pop, and dammit it all if she wasn't teetering on the threshold of madness.

 

She pressed herself harder against him, and bless him, he figured out what was going on pretty quickly because he bucked back against her and dropped his head down to her breasts. She writhed underneath him, gasping for air, and then he bit down on one nipple while pinching the other and she went right over the precipice, flying off into oblivion.

 

“Fuck me,” she cursed when she was no longer seeing stars. She stretched languidly underneath him, feeling more relaxed than she had in ages, and for the love of all that was good, she had literally no idea what the hell they'd been thinking when they broke up all those years ago.

 

She pushed him off her, ignoring the hurt expression that ghosted across his features because did he really think she was going to leave him hanging after an orgasm like that?

 

She came up to a kneeling position on the bed, shoving him down onto his back and straddling his legs. He tried to help her with the fastenings on his pants, but she slapped him away. “Stop it. Let me do this,” she ordered, and he tucked his hands behind his head to watch her work.

 

Closures undone, he raised his hips as she tugged his jeans down. She could see the outline of his erection through his come-stained boxer briefs, and even if she hadn't necessarily thought of doing it until that moment, all she could think about was getting him out of those shorts and wrapping her lips around his cock.

 

So she told him.

 

“Oh fuck, yes, please,” he begged, and she grinned as he enthusiastically canted his hips toward her face.

 

“Settle down, hot stuff,” she said, but she wasn't really expecting him to obey because she chose that moment to pull his underwear down over his ass, freeing his erection to bob tantalizingly in front of her face. She bit her lip to stop herself from gasping (fuck, he was beautiful), but he obviously knew what was on her mind because he chuckled.

 

Oh, she was definitely going to wipe that smirk off his face.

 

She dropped down to her belly between his legs, stroking the insides of his thighs, nuzzling them, but studiously avoiding the part of him that strained for her touch the most. She pressed her lips carefully around his pelvis, around the base of his cock, peering up at him as she worked. His mouth was wide open as he tried to breathe, and his hands were running over his torso. She knew he wanted to sink his fingers into her hair, knew he wanted to guide her motions, but he was stopping himself out of some displaced sense of chivalry. Deciding to reward him for his restraint, she took him into her mouth suddenly, swallowing him down until she could go no further, using her hands to stroke him as she sucked.

 

He let out a wild noise at that, and she hoped to hell he had understanding neighbors because she wanted to hear that sound again. As often as possible, really.

 

He tasted better than she remembered, but maybe that was just because she'd been wanting him for so long; maybe it was because she'd been imagining this all night. She licked and sucked, enjoying the wanton noises he was making deep in his throat, and she felt herself grow wetter from the sound. She snaked a hand down down her body, slid two fingers between her folds to rub quick circles around her clit in time to her strokes on his cock.

 

Things were just starting to get really interesting when she felt him shift. He struggled to a half-sitting position, resting on one elbow and tapping on her side as he said, “Let me taste your pussy while you do that.”

 

All to happy to comply, she released him long enough to swing her legs around. He tugged her down on top of him, letting her weight rest fully on his torso. She licked him once slowly from base to tip, and when she felt him do the same, when he ran his tongue along the length of her slit, she thought she might pass out.

 

She ground herself against his face, humming appreciatively around his cock when he slipped a few fingers into her pussy. He still knew all the ways to touch her, all the places to which he should apply pressure to make her feel like collapsing into a puddle, and _fuck_ _,_ she'd missed this about him.

 

When he started to knead her ass, her brain froze, shut completely off, and she had to press her face against his thigh just to keep breathing. He fucked her with his tongue then, pushing inside of her, eating her until her world narrowed to his face between her legs.

 

She came abruptly, fiercely, harder than before, pushing so hard against his face that she thought she might suffocate him. She turned over her shoulder to look at him, and found him staring at her with a look of dazed wonder writ large across his features.

 

“Nat,” he choked out, her name half a prayer, half a curse. “You're so fucking beautiful,” he said, awestruck, the rawness of his gaze and his tone hitting her like a punch to the gut. He pulled on her leg, his desperation coming through in the mad scrabble of limbs, the way they awkwardly reoriented themselves until she was straddling him once more, perched over him with her hands braced on his chest.

 

He gripped her tightly, restricting her motion when she would've dropped right down on him. “Hang on, sweetheart,” he said, sounding just as strained as she felt. “Condom.”

 

Right.

 

Fuck, she couldn't believe she'd almost forgotten, couldn't believe that he'd gotten her to the point of recklessness so easily. Even before, even when they were together, they hadn't ever gone bareback, and now, well, she'd never been shy about taking people to bed, and neither had Clint.

 

She was grateful that he, at least, had been able to keep his wits about him. She blamed the orgasms he'd already given her for her lapse.

 

Clint tore the packet open with his teeth, and she helped roll the latex down over him, impatient to have him inside of her, stretching her, filling her up and making her squirm. It had been too long since she'd had him inside of her, too long since she'd felt him explode between her thighs, and she could taste the need on the back of her tongue, a flavor thick with urgency.

 

She reached between them, grasping his length and pumping him teasingly even as she positioned herself above him. Anxious for more, his hands flew to her hips to pull her down onto him, and they both released air they'd been holding as she slid down onto him, taking him to the hilt.

 

“You feel so fucking good,” one of them said, and it didn't matter who because they were both thinking it. She felt herself flutter as she stretched around him, and she squeezed him, circling her hips in an effort to get closer, to feel him deeper.

 

He started to move then, digging his fingertips into the meat of her hips, and she sagged forward, suddenly boneless. He slipped his hand to where their bodies joined, thumbed firmly at her clit, and she felt herself start to move toward another orgasm. Nothing had ever been this good, _no one_ had ever been this good, and she silently thanked herself from two hours ago for thinking it was a great idea to get into a taxi with an inebriated Clint Barton.

 

He was moaning her name on repeat as they rocked together, a litany that she returned, and she didn't give a single shit that they probably sounded ridiculous because she'd been needing to come like this for . . . well, forever, and _fuck_.

 

Just . . . just, fuck.

 

She felt the telltale signs of his impending release, felt him start to pump more artlessly up into her, heard his breathing hitch in his throat, and the thumb on her clit grew more erratic. That was okay though because she could feel the familiar warmth deep in her guts, felt it swelling up, washing over her body, and then he shot up, sitting upright, pulling her face to his and the angle was so fucking perfect and his mouth was a firebrand against hers and he started to come and it was too much and . . . and . . .

 

Oh, _fuck_.

 

She must have blacked out there at the end because the next thing she knew, she was cradled against Clint's side, tucked into the crook of his arm, her face pressed against his chest. He was threading his fingers though her hair idly, detangling it, and the familiarity of the gesture brought a sudden tear to her eye.

 

God, she'd missed him.  


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The last bit! Thanks for reading! If you've got a moment, I'd love to hear what you think!

 God, he'd missed her.

 

They've been around each other, circling each other for years, ever since she'd left her old life behind and joined the Avengers. And even if things were awkward between them for a while, they'd become friends again. She was a real friend, the kind he could tell anything to, the kind that didn't put up with his shit, and would bail him out of jail at three in the morning. He didn't have a lot of those in his life, and Natasha, well, Natasha was the first among very few.

 

He'd learned to content himself with that friendship because he couldn't live without her, and he'd convinced himself that as long as she was reasonably happy, he would be, too.

 

And then Tony threw a New Year's party, and she'd let him take her home. He'd question how he got so lucky, but that would probably ruin it.

 

He fully recognized that he was thinking too hard, particularly since the woman in question was currently draped across him. He'd always been a _carpe diem_ kind of guy, but there was something about Natasha that drew out the sentimentality in him. He brought a lock of her hair to his face, breathed her in, the lightest remnant of her shampoo (something herbal, minty) lingering amid the stronger scent of sex that permeated the room.

 

“What are you thinking?” she murmured, twisting her face up toward his, resting her chin on his chest.

 

He grinned. “Just how glad I am that I ran into you on that balcony.” It was true, after all, even if it wasn't exactly what he'd been thinking at the moment.

 

“Yeah?” she asked, returning his smile, amusement dancing in her eyes. “So you weren't just going to go home with the first girl who batted her eyelashes at you?”

 

She said it without malice, easy flirtation coloring her words instead.

 

“Nah, I was holding out for the first girl to offer me a drink that cost more than my car.”

 

She stretched up, pressing her lips lightly to the corner of his grin. “You don't own a car, Clint,” she whispered against his lips, tracing her tongue along the edge of his mouth.

 

He shrugged, rolling her onto her back and hovering over her. “Details,” he said, and then he kissed her, slowly, carefully, thoroughly. She was pliant and warm below him, relaxed in a way that he'd never seen, and he wanted to shout with joy that he'd been the one to bring her there. The suspicious twinge in his chest deepened along with their kiss, tongues sliding languidly across each other, skin pressing against skin, and he wanted to drown in her scent, her taste, her touch. He ached for her, burned for her, loved her more than the air he breathed. What the hell was she doing to him?

 

It took a moment for his brain to catch up with his thoughts.

 

 _Wait_ , he thought. _Backup._ _Love_?

 

Sure, he loved her, but was he _in_ love with her? He broke off their kiss and rested his forehead against hers, panting. Cupping the side of her face in his palm, he ran a thumb over her bottom lip, swollen and red and full. She nipped playfully at him, her eyes flashing with delight, and the impish grin she gave him plucked at his heartstrings.

 

Well, he had his answer, at least.

 

He could taste the words on his tongue (he'd always had a big mouth, too big for his own good), but then her fingers slipped around his still-sensitive cock, gripped him, and he bit his lip until he tasted blood to keep from calling out. With a twist of her hips and a burst of force from deceptively small wrists, she flipped him over onto his back, her smile turning wicked in the dim light filtering in from the street.

 

“Fuck, Nat,” he hissed, and he looked down between them to see her palm his cock, to see her stroke him back to full attention. She squeezed him once, twice, and a drop of precome glistened on his glans, and Jesus fucking Christ, she was sliding down his body, bending over him, looking up at him as she licked the moisture away.

 

He repeated his previous curse, and she chuckled.

 

“I know what you like, Clint,” she said, and his name had never sounded so good as it did rumbling out of Natasha's mouth, especially given the way said mouth was hovering next to his dick. She nuzzled his length with her cheek, pressed a kiss to the side of it, an oddly tender gesture at odds with the utterly filthy look she was shooting him, and goddammit, yeah, he still fucking loved her.

 

He was starting to worry in earnest that his thoughts were going to make themselves apparent, that they would spill out into the open and wreck the fragile thing that had grown up between them in the last few hours, but then she swallowed him down and he wasn't thinking about much of anything at all.

 

Her lips were hot and slick around him, and he felt her tongue swirling around the tip of his cock as she sucked him, and fuck, this was every dirty fantasy he'd had for the past decade playing out in front of him. He couldn't tear his eyes away from her, not for a second, and he held her face between his palms while she blew him, licking him, tasting him, scraping her teeth lightly on his cock.

 

He felt himself approach the edge of orgasm with a strong sense of disbelief; he'd never had trouble getting it back up after an orgasm, but he'd only rarely come twice in such a short amount of time. Now that he thought about it, the last time had been with Natasha, too.

 

He twitched his thumb where it pressed into the side of her face, drawing her attention. “Baby, as much as I want to come down your throat, I'd rather put my hard on to better use and fuck you senseless.”

 

She released him, pressed a surprisingly sweet kiss to the top of his dick, and said, “Sounds good to me.”

 

She slid back up his body, and he kissed her, licking his taste from her mouth, the blend of them assaulting his senses. She moaned against his lips, twisting her arms around his neck to hold him closer, and his arms tightened low around her back in response.

 

She straddled him then, her knees pressing into either side of his waist and he nearly lost his sense of control when he felt her wet slit rub against his cock. She moaned throatily, opening her eyes and smiling even as she continued to kiss him.

 

“You're a real hot piece of ass, Barton,” she said in between nips. “Why the fuck did we break up again?”

 

He just laughed. “Sex with you was never the problem, babe.”

 

She smiled ruefully, obviously remembering the string of events that had led to their separation.

 

“That was a long time ago,” she said quietly, still clinging to him, so he knew she wasn't annoyed. “We've both changed a lot.”

 

He tucked a finger under her chin, tilted her face up toward his. “For the better, I think,” he said soberly, and he pressed a swift kiss to her lips. “You, for example, somehow managed to get hotter.”

 

She smirked and kissed him back.

 

They didn't talk anymore then, just fell into the easy rhythms of sex, gasping into the air, breathing each other in, hands and lips and teeth rediscovering every nook and cranny they'd ever half-remembered in a wet dream. She flailed for another condom, digging around blindly until she found one, and she tore the packet open swiftly, urgently. This time, she rolled the thin latex over him, taking her time with it, staring at him, his face close enough to hers that he could see her pupils dilate.

 

She guided herself down onto him with a low moan, one that he echoed, their voices tangling in the air the way their bodies were on the bed. They rocked together slowly, maintaining eye contact, and the intimacy implicit there hit him like a punch to the gut. She never would have done this before, never would have been this vulnerable, this open, not when they were younger and dumber and less jaded. But now, here in his apartment on the shitty side of town, now, she didn't shy away from his gaze, met his eyes unabashedly, and little gasps erupted out of her open mouth with every thrust of his hips.

 

“Clint . . .” she breathed, unable to get her thought out. He knew the feeling. “Need . . .” she tried again.

 

He slowed his hips, touched her cheek, her brow. “What do you need, Nat?” He'd do anything for her, anything she asked him. That, at least, had never changed.

 

“Fuck me,” she said, and it sounded ridiculous, must have sounded that way to her, too because she snorted, rolled her eyes at herself, and then turned her head and bit her lip, squeezing his cock inside of her and shuddering delicately with pleasure.

 

“I want you to fuck me from behind.”

 

“I think I can manage that,” he said, and then he helped her to her knees, bent her over in front of him. “You have a beautiful ass, baby,” he narrated, splaying his hands low on her back and parting her ass cheeks with his thumbs. “Shit, your pussy is wet.”

 

“Wet for you,” she said, punctuating her words with a strange, animalistic noise.

 

He dipped his fingers inside of her briefly, teasingly. “Jesus, Nat,” he groaned. He removed his fingers to her vocal disapproval, but then he replaced the void with his cock, bottoming out inside of her, filling her up until his balls slapped against her pussy. She cursed in Russian, too quickly for him to follow, but he'd been around her enough to recognize the intent.

 

He leaned down over her, pressing his chest and stomach to her back, and she arched into his palms when he gripped her breasts.

 

“Yesssss,” she hissed, and he was really fucking glad she was so strong because it freed up both of his hands to touch her. As much as he liked grabbing hold of her tits, he also really liked rubbing her clit while he fucked her, liked feeling her ripple around his cock and his fingers simultaneously, and this way he could do both.

 

She ground out instructions from between gritted teeth, and he felt her start to flutter, start to ripple and clench around him. He pinched her clit between his fingers, bit down on the crook of her neck, told her she was beautiful, hot, everything he'd ever wanted, had ever dreamed about, had ever needed and then she was coming, crying out his name. He couldn't stop himself, couldn't stave his orgasm off any longer because she really was everything he'd said, and he exploded inside of her, whiting out from the pleasure, the intensity of it all.

 

They collapsed together in a heap on their sides, and he pulled her back against him when she might have shied away, when once upon a time she _would_ have shied away. Maybe they were both different people now because she didn't try to shrink back from him, but just the opposite. She nestled into him, dropped her hand down to his thigh to draw him closer, and she melted against his mouth when he turned her face to kiss her.

 

“Missed you,” she whispered, and he'd never agreed with anything more.

 

<><><><><>

 

She wasn't sure when she'd fallen asleep; Clint had preceded her into slumber (some things would never change), and as much as she had wanted to sleep through the night, the unfamiliar bed had kept her from finding true rest, despite how relaxed she was.

 

She'd woken up last around three in the morning, and she'd ended up staring at him, watching the rise and fall of his chest. Maybe the soothing sounds of his breathing had put her back out, but she was awake again now, and alone in bed. She reached out, touched the sheets beside her, found them still warm. He hadn't been up long. She searched around the room for the clock, found the green light of the digital readout on top of what was either a bookcase or a dresser.

 

5 am.

 

Looked like she'd ended up staying the night.

 

She sat up and stretched, listening for Clint. She thought she heard the sound of running water and the clinking of a glass out in the kitchen. She stood, fumbled around on the floor for something to ward off the early morning chill, but came up short. She shrugged and headed out toward the main room naked. It was nothing he hadn't seen after all. Nothing he hadn't licked, for that matter.

 

She found him bent over, leaning on the kitchen counter with a glass of water in his hand. She moved softly enough that he didn't hear her approach, and she raked her gaze slowly over his body, appreciating the sight of him, dressed in nothing but his boxer briefs as he sipped.

 

“Hey,” she said softly, and she realized she must have been mistaken about him not noticing her because he turned toward her without surprise. His eyes traveled up and down her body, taking her in, and she stood still, feeling herself react to the unabashed appreciation writ all over his features.

 

“Hey,” he said at last, leaning on one arm. “Did I wake you?”

 

She shook her head and moved to stand next to him. She took the glass when he offered it, drained the remainder of the contents.

 

“Thanks,” she said.

 

They were quiet for a while, standing next to each other under the fluorescent light.

 

Breaking the silence, he asked quietly, “Still no regrets?”

 

She could hear the uncertainty in his voice, the underlying question about his value that he wasn't willing to pose outright. She remembered this about him, knew all about his self-worth issues – it was what enabled her to manipulate him back when they'd first been together. It wasn't that he wasn't aware of it; Clint knew better than to trust people, knew that it was a weakness of his. He'd had his trust and his heart broken so very often in his life, but he _wanted_ to trust, would reach out again and again, only to have his hand slapped away.

 

Looking at him there, forehead muddled with uncertainty, she was transported back a decade, back to when she'd left him in the lurch, when she'd betrayed him. She hadn't wanted to do it, hadn't wanted to hurt him, not really, but then neither had she the intention of getting in that deep with him in the first place. He was only supposed to have been a means to end, and instead he turned out to be one of the only good things that had ever happened to her. It had nearly killed her to do it, and she was grateful every day that he was big enough, good enough to forgive her those sins. She liked to think that he eventually understood her motives, understood that she never wanted to hurt him.

 

For all that, she thought that the friendship, the trust that had grown up between was better, deeper, more meaningful than what their relationship had been, could ever have been, operating under such false pretenses. Wondering if he knew she felt that way, she touched his cheek lightly, cupped his face in her hand.

 

“No regrets here, Clint,” she said.

 

She could see him wrestling with his next question, knew that he didn't want to ask it. She also knew he needed to ask it, whatever it was, so she kissed the corner of his eyes and said, “Tell me.”

 

He bit his lip, looking so very young and for a moment she was back in the little dive bar on the shit end of the town where they'd met, and her heart ached for him.

 

“It's okay, whatever it is,” she said, imbuing her tone with as much honesty as she was able. “You know that, right? You're _my_ best friend, too.”

 

He looked away before he spoke. “I just . . .” He laughed under his breath, almost as if to himself. “We didn't make a mistake, then?”

 

She got it, knew what he was bothered about then, and if she were perfectly honest with herself, she was troubled by it, too. They'd been friends for so long, just friends and nothing else, and this could interfere with that, if they let it. She didn't have a lot of friends, not real ones, not people she could count on to drag her ass out of the fire when shit got real.

 

Given all of that, all the baggage and the uncertainty, she said the only thing she could think to say.

 

“I've made a lot of mistakes in my life, but you weren't . . . you _aren't_ one of them, Clint.” She leaned in close, ducked down a bit and put herself underneath his face, right in his line of sight. Whispering now, sensing the importance of her statement, she said it again. “You aren't a mistake, Clint.”

 

A lifetime of pain and doubt crossed between them in the space of three heartbeats, their frantic breathing the only sound in the room. It was so much, too much, and he must have felt it too because he grabbed her, pulled her against him, and he kissed her like she was the most precious thing in his life.

 

He certainly was in hers.

 

She wrapped herself around him, pressed her body against his, her breasts flattened against his chest, her stomach against his stomach. He bent her backward, threaded his fingers in her hair, and it felt like he was consuming her, eating her whole, breathing her in and making her a part of him. It was all she could do to hang on for the ride.

 

They dropped to the floor without thinking, sinking down into a puddle of intertwined limbs. She wrapped her legs around his waist when he laid her on the linoleum, and she thrust upward against him, desperate for him, needing to get closer, needing to get him under her skin the same way she'd gotten under his. It was as natural as breathing, the way they came together, and she reached between them, helped him pull his underwear down over his hips, freeing his cock with a growl. This time, neither one of them thought about a condom, neither one of them wanted it, and as stupid, as reckless and idiotic as it was, maybe it was what they needed in that moment, to be together without a single barrier between them.

 

He felt like fire inside of her, a thick, heavy heat between her legs, and she moaned freely as he thrust into her. She never recalled feeling like this, not with anyone, not even with him; she never even thought she could feel like this, and, damn it all, she never wanted it to end. He fucked her relentlessly there on his kitchen floor, except that it wasn't fucking at all, more like that other thing, that act she dared not name for fear that it would make it too real, more real than she could bear right now with her emotions so raw.

 

His mouth never left hers as he moved inside of her, and she imagined that she could feel his body fuse to hers, become part of her, and when they came, it was together, endless wave after wave of pleasure that overrode her brain and all of her good intentions and left her screaming her release into his mouth.

 

He kissed her forehead, her eyelids, her cheeks as they came back down, clinging to each other. He nuzzled her, rested his head in the crook of her neck, and her back might regret it later, but for the moment, she was content.

 

She was drifting off again when he roused her, tugged her to her feet and took her into his arms. Were it anyone else in any other situation, she would resist, wouldn't let herself be carried, but this was Clint, and she trusted him, so when he swung her up in his arms, she went willingly, sighed into him and hooked her arms loosely around his neck.

 

He tucked her carefully into his bed, tugging the blanket up over her shoulders and joining her, pulling her into his arms.

 

“Hey, Nat?” he asked, a bare whisper in the early morning dark, one that registered dimly on the edge of her rapidly fading consciousness.

 

“Hmm?”

 

“I'm glad you're here.”

 

“Me, too.”


End file.
